Never Give Up! A Story of Inspiration Many Years in the Making

My daughter was 4 years old when she broke her arm. She was riding her bicycle, made too sharp of a turn in a cul-du-sac, fell, and broke her arm. I had a similar experience, only I was a few years older and broke my leg instead of my arm. Perhaps the biggest difference between my daughter’s experience and mine was I didn’t stop riding my bike once my leg was healed. For all intents and purposes, she stopped riding once she broke her arm.

Elmo tricycle

That is, until recently. Yes, 7 years after breaking her arm, my daughter started riding her bicycle again. It had been so long she had pretty much forgotten how to ride so my husband and I paid for private lessons with REI, which I highly recommend. Within those two-hour-long lessons she was riding her bicycle, albeit a little shakily, but she was riding nonetheless.

We started going for family bike rides, starting out on the widest, flattest roads we could find near our house. My poor daughter’s calves were bruised from hitting them against the pedals. She would get spooked by a car coming or something else, hit the curb, and fall off her bike, but this time, she’d get back on. Sure, there was plenty of complaining, yelling, and frustration from her. Things weren’t all rosy, but I told her, yes, riding a bike is hard at first. It will just take time.

Picking strawberries with a broken arm

The main thing is, she stuck with it this time. I’m extremely proud of her that she didn’t just give up, saying it was too hard. Truth be told, riding a bicycle after an injury is hard, mentally, as I know firsthand. You get nervous when you pick up speed or when you’re going around a sharp turn. You have flashbacks of when you were injured. But after a while, you realize that you are safe and the chances of getting badly injured aren’t that great. Sure, you’re cautious, but every good cyclist should be cautious, honestly.

My daughter is also on a year-round swim team and runs 5k’s. I have no doubt that adding cycling to the mix will only enhance her swimming and running. Does she have plans to do a triathlon any time soon? No, but maybe in a few years. You never know, because just a few years ago, she would have told you she didn’t ride a bike, but now to look at her you’d think she’s been riding for years.

She’s an inspiration to me and even though I’m her mother and am certainly biased, I’m extremely proud of her for not giving up. I guess her stubborn nature has its benefits at times.

When I let her read this post while I was working on it, her response was that I was making too much of a big deal out of it. I don’t agree, though. I think the fact that she didn’t give up learning to ride her bicycle despite everything she went through is a message worth getting out. If there’s something you’ve been putting off or too afraid to do, just get out there and do it. It’s never too late!

Day Trip to Pichilemu, Chile

Pichilemu is on the western coast of Chile, about a 3 hour drive from Santiago, in the O’Higgins Region. We decided to take a day trip here from Las Cabras, just under a 2 hour drive. The drive here is scenic so the time goes by quickly.

In addition to beaches, this area is famous for Central Cultural Agustín Ross. This historic area created by diplomat Agustín Ross Edwards dates back to the late 1800’s and includes a park, former casino,hotel, and restaurant. The park overlooks the beach “Playa Principal” and is a nice place to sit on a bench to take a break.

Bosque Municipal is a forest right across the road from Agustín Park and has many palm and pine trees along with other varieties of trees. It is a nice respite from the heat and is a quiet place to enjoy nature for a walk.

Other beaches in the area include Playa Las Terraza, Playa Hermosa, Playa Las Caletilla, and Playa Infiernillo. La Puntilla, the tip of Playa Las Terraza, is considered one of the best spots in Pichilemu for surfing. Punta de Lobos beach is an even more popular surfing area and is considered the surfing capital of Chile. The waves here are between 1 to 9 meters high, and are best between September to May.

There are numerous surf schools, many of which look like shacks put together solely with plywood and a piece of metal for the roof. You can also kitesurf, windsurf, and bodyguard. Fishing is a staple trade in this area and you’ll see many fishing boats and fresh fish stalls.

You can find many restaurants, cafes, and kiosks selling everything from ice cream to empanadas to plastic shovels and pails for the beach. We also passed a few hostels in town. Cabañas seem to be plentiful in the area as well so it appears there would be no shortage of places to stay for a vacation here.

This is definitely a beach town so unless you’re here during the summer months of December, January, or February, you’re going to find a sleepy town. Still, it’s a fun day-trip even in the off-season. However, during the summer, you’ll have more options like bike and kayak rentals, hiking, and camping tours, and other outdoor activities.

Since we were here in late May during the off season, it was quiet and some of the kiosks were closed. However, we still found plenty that were open and had no problem finding a stand selling hot and fresh empanadas, which we hungrily devoured. Later in the day we bought bread and ham to make sandwiches and dessert from a bakery. We enjoyed our food while sitting on a small cliff over-looking the ocean. It was a nice way to end our day in Pichilemu. After all, a beautiful beach is still a beautiful beach no matter what time of year it is.

Rio los Cipreses Nacional Reserva (National Park in Chile)

The Rio los Cipreses Nacional Reserva is in the Bernardo O’Higgins region but good luck finding it on your own unless you’re from the region! You will be unable to find directions using Google maps. The best you can do is what we did, find the closest town and hope you see signs from there. We drove to Coya and from there you can easily follow the signs to the park. Fortunately for us, the signs for the park are well-marked and plentiful so once we found the first sign, we had no problems getting to the entrance. There was a tourism office in Coya but no one was there when we tried.

Admission to the park is $5000 Chilean pesos, or about $7.50 US for adults and $2500 Chilean pesos per child, valid for one day. There are six trails, from the best I can tell. A portion of the main access road through the park was closed (no idea why) the day we visited so we couldn’t get to some of the trails but we went on all  of the ones we could access.

Trail is “sendero” in Spanish. We went on Sendero La Hacienda, Sendero Las Arpas, Sendero Los Tricahues, and Sendero Los Puemos, but Sendero Puente La Leona was closed. All of the trails have a unique aspect to them from one another. There is a waterfall along the Sendero Los Puemos, Sendero Los Tricahues has an almost fairytale like feeling, and Sendero Las Arpas has what seemed like a resident fox that followed us around the trail curiously watching us, but was truly the most friendly fox I’ve ever seen. It must be used to seeing people, some of which probably feed it.

All along the park, we had views of the Andes Mountains towering above grandly. There are also picnic areas so you can have lunch with views of the mountains, which makes for one scenic lunch. Although they didn’t appear to be open when we were there, there are camping areas available. In addition to the friendly fox, there are pumas in the area. We never saw one, but there was the pungent odor of cat urine by one of the water crossings, which could have been from a puma. We also came across a very large wooden crate that looked like one used for capture and release. I probably don’t want to know what that was used for. There are also many types of birds, trees, and flowers native to the area.

Translation: I do not love man less, but nature more. Quote by Lord Byron.

There’s a funny story that happened to us. We were on our last trail for the day, Sendero La Hacienda, and saw hoof prints again. We had seen them on other trails and had followed them when in doubt of where to go if the trail became not so well marked, thinking they were from horses with riders. Then my daughter said, “Hey, there are actually other people on this trail too!” We hadn’t seen a soul on any of the previous trails we had been on all day. As we got closer, she realized what she had thought were people were cows. We also realized what we had thought were horse hoof prints had really been cow hoof prints. No wonder we got pretty far off the trail at times!

We didn’t expect to see cows at this national park!

Although this park isn’t the easiest to get to, I highly recommend spending a day here. Parking is pretty scarce, so it would be best if you arrive relatively early to make sure you can find a parking spot. Also, there is a place that advertised having food right by the administration office, but it didn’t look like it was open when we were there. We always like to pack a picnic lunch when we go on all-day hikes, so it wasn’t a problem for us. You should also bring sunscreen and plenty of water. There are bathrooms along several areas in the park. They close just before sunset so if you arrive in the morning you’ll have plenty of time to go on all of the trails (or at least most of them) and have a nice picnic lunch.

More details on the trails:

Sendero La Hacienda is 5000 meters, highly difficult, is about 1 kilometer from the administration building, and takes approximately 1 ½ hours.

Sendero Las Arpas is 1000 meters, easy, approximately 3 kilometers from the administration building, and takes approximately 30 minutes.

Sendero Los Tricahues is 200 meters, minimally difficult, approximately 5. 5 meters from the administration building, and takes approximately 20 minutes.

Sendero Los Tricahues

Sendero Los Puemos is 1700 meters, is medium in difficulty, approximately 6 kilometers from the administration building, and takes approximately 45 minutes.

Caminata a Maltenes is 6000 meters, is highly difficult, approximately 6 kilometers from the administration building, and takes approximately 2 hours.

Sendero Puente La Leona is 7000 meters, is highly difficult, and takes approximately 3 hours.

Find (slightly) more information here. And the official site (in Spanish) here.

An American in Chile- Getting Outside My Comfort Zone

After spending time in Santiago, Vina del Mar and Valparaiso, we drove to Las Cabras in the O’Higgins Region of Chile. We quickly realized how spoiled we were in the first three regions in comparison to the O’Higgins region. Using our limited knowledge of Spanish, we could easily get by communicating with others in all areas except the last one. Here, even less people spoke English than before. We were pretty much on our own. This is a difficult and isolating feeling. Now I understand how other people that come to the United States from other countries with limited knowledge of English must feel.

I can read Spanish much better than I can speak it and can understand the spoken word even less. However, between my husband, daughter, and myself we can usually figure out enough to get by. If I was a solo traveler, I would have had much more difficulty getting around Chile. Now I see why total immersion works when learning a foreign language. It’s a whole different thing when you’re forced to speak and understand another language.

Americans are catered to in so many other countries, especially European countries. For example, when we were in Greece, the highway signs and many business signs were in English as well as Greek. Many people spoke English as well as Greek so we really had no problems communicating. The same was true in Austria and Germany. We had no problems finding someone whose English was better than our broken German. However, in Chile, we found entire towns where no one spoke English, or at least that’s what we encountered. We were told by Claudia, a woman working at the resort area where we rented a condo for a week that no one else in the region spoke fluent English other than her. I have no idea if that’s absolutely true, but of all of the people we encountered, no one else spoke more than a word or two of English.

One thing I learned from my vacation in Chile is this:  if your Spanish is extremely limited you should be OK if you stick to more populated areas like Santiago. If you want to venture out to less touristy, less populated areas, you had better make sure your Spanish is pretty good or you will be completely lost. You also have to have a sense of humor, sense of adventure, and be willing to go without some of the things you have in the United States. For example, when shopping in a market in the small town where we were staying, our options for foods to take back to the apartment and cook for dinner were not things we would have ordinarily bought back home, but here we knew we had to just go with the flow.

Another thing I learned is that many Chileans are not used to seeing and interacting with Americans. It was obvious to other people, especially in the small towns, that my family and I were outsiders. They would give us curious looks when they saw us. When we spoke English to each other, people would turn around and look at us, even in Santiago and Viña del Mar. We found most people to be extremely patient and kind when we tried to speak Spanish. We were snapped at (in Spanish) only at the metro station in Santiago when we asked if the person at the ticket booth spoke English after we had trouble understanding her very fast Spanish. I understand why she was like that, because she’s got a fast-paced job to do, so I don’t fault her.

After visiting Chile I now personally understand the term culture shock. I hadn’t fully experienced it before so I didn’t truly appreciate it. Previously when I traveled to foreign countries, I had been sheltered in resorts full of English-speaking workers, or I had been to areas of that world that basically cater to Americans.

I also completely understand why so many Americans travel to South America with a group led by a tour guide. It’s difficult to be in a foreign country with limited knowledge of the language. It puts you outside of your comfort zone, which many people don’t like. I think it’s good every now and then to go outside your comfort zone, though. It helps you grow as a person and shows you that you are stronger than you thought you were.

How to Raise an Active Child

I have to admit it makes me cringe when I hear parents say things like, “My child isn’t active.  She doesn’t have any interest in sports,” or, “My child doesn’t play sports.  He’d rather do other things.” When I come back with questions like, what activities have they tried, the parent will usually only give one activity. WHAT? Over the years, my eleven-year-old daughter has been in ballet, gymnastics, on multiple soccer teams, volleyball camps, a running camp and after-school running group, and swimming teams. She’s also had tennis lessons and snow skiing lessons. My husband and I decided when she was 4 or 5 that she would be involved in some sort of activity and if we had to try them all until we found one that stuck, then so be it.

So of all of the activities above listed, which one(s) stuck with my daughter? She’s now an avid swimmer and runner but all of the other activities fell to the wayside. My daughter has been on a year-round swim team for several years now and is going to try out for her school track and field team as soon as she is able next spring. That being said, our road to her being an avid runner has not always been easy.

My daughter’s first experience with running came when I signed her up for the kids’ dash at the Susan G. Koman Race for the Cure. She was three years old and ran 50 yards.

Susan G. Koman Race for the Cure

After the Kids’ Dash at the Race for the Cure, her next major running event didn’t happen for several years later. When she was 8, she ran in a kids’ marathon where she ran with a running group at her school, tracking her miles up to 25.2 and ran the final mile on the adult marathon course. A year later, I ran a half marathon in Branson, Missouri, the Roller Coaster Half Marathon and they offered a one mile run for kids. She ended up finishing in 8:25, despite the extremely hilly course during a cold, rainy morning and she had just turned 9 years old then. Sounds pretty good so far, right? Fast forward a bit from there and things went downhill quickly.

Gymnastics is really hard if you’re a super-tall kid, like mine is

I am a runner with a goal of running a half marathon in all 50 states. So far I’m up to my 40th state and I’ve been doing this since before my daughter was born. I currently run three races a year, so I’m out running quite a lot throughout the year. A few years ago she asked if she could run with me, to which I replied sure, thinking it would be a great way for us to bond. Then the whining and complaining started. She would say, “This is too hard!” and complain that she was too hot or too thirsty or too tired, and on and on. I told her before we even left the house that she would be setting our pace and if she wanted to take walk breaks that was fine. Quickly, however, I realized it just wasn’t working. She’d only last a few minutes before she was ready to walk and the whole time she would be complaining and whining. I couldn’t take it any longer.

Running the last mile of the kids’ marathon

Instead of giving up, however, I tried a different approach. I signed her up with Girls on the run, an after-school running group meant to encourage girls to live a healthy active life and help them build up their confidence in themselves over a 10 week period that culminates in a 5k event. This worked even better than I could have imagined.. Not only did she see that she was indeed a good runner but she began to gradually build a love for running. Since that Girls on the Run 5k, she’s gone on to run three other 5k races, one of which she won second place in her age group.

Not only is my daughter a runner, she’s also an avid swimmer, her true love. At a pretty young age (two), I had put her in swimming lessons and she had always taken to the water well. So after ballet and gymnastics didn’t work out, I decided to put her on a swim team during the school months when she was in the second grade. This was the activity for her! She loved her coach and even enjoyed participating in swim meets. Since then she has had multiple coaches and has been on two different swim teams and if anything her love for swimming has only increased.

First swim meet at the young age of 7

What is the biggest take-away from all of this? Don’t give up! If you put your child in a sports camp and it goes horribly, try another sport. If gymnastics isn’t for your child, try tennis, or basketball, or running, or ice hockey, or volleyball, or pick another sport. Keep trying until something sticks with your child. There are so many activities offered in most areas of the US that surely your child will enjoy one of them. Most of all, though, don’t wait. The younger you get your child active, the more it will become a normal part of their life.

Another piece of advice, don’t push your child too hard. Coaches are there to do their job so don’t try to coach your child or you risk turning your child away from the sport completely because it’s too much pressure. Simply encourage your child and tell them often how proud you are of them no matter what.

For resources in your area, try searching Eventbrite. Among other things such as music, they have a link specifically for sports and wellness and one for classes; both links include activities for children as well as adults. You can even search for specific events or categories or search by dates. I’ve found it to be a great resource for finding things going on in my area and when I’m traveling as well. Check out this tool to help you find events in your area.

How many of you are like me and are proud to have active kids? What activities are your kids involved in? Have you found it to always be easy to keep your kids active or has it also been a struggle at times for you?

Happy running!

Donna

Las Cabras in the O’Higgins Region, Chile- A Test of Resilience

When we drove into Las Cabras in the O’Higgins region from Vina del Mar  and went to check in at the small resort where we were staying, we felt like we were in an episode from ‘The Twilight Zone.” Although we were staying in a golf resort area, there was no front desk, no reception area, no one to greet us and give us our key. The people at the front gate noted our names on a sheet of paper they had, so we were pretty sure we were at least in the right place.

After driving around the property and finding condos and houses, we stopped at the only thing resembling a building for check-in. We later found out that was where golfers check in before they play a round of golf. The woman working there spoke no English but with our limited Spanish we were able to get her to call someone else who spoke a small amount of English. This man arrived in a few minutes and was very kind and helpful. He got us in touch with the woman I can only assume is responsible for checking in guests in at the resort, and thankfully she spoke some English. Her name was Claudia.

Claudia handed us a folder containing the resort rules (all in Spanish), and said “Make yourselves at home. Treat this place as if it was your home.” With that, she handed us the keys to the apartment, wrote down her phone number (although we had no cell phone coverage in Chile, and we had told her that), and she left. Claudia told us while there was no Wi-Fi in the condos, there was Wi-Fi in the restaurant for the property, which was just across the street from the front gate. No big deal. When we recently stayed at one of the hotels in the Grand Canyon , it was the same thing and we would just check emails and get maps, etc. when we were at the restaurant there.

View from a hilltop in our resort

After getting settled in, we drove to the restaurant and were told there was no Wi-Fi at the restaurant or anywhere in town for that matter, for the next three days (or at least that’s how we interpreted it since the person at the restaurant spoke no English). WHAT? No Wi-Fi for three days?! We hadn’t planned ahead very well and hadn’t downloaded maps for the area or things to do.

We drove into town, searching for cafes or restaurants that had signs for Wi-Fi, gave up, and went to a few different mini-markets (we found they were all different inside even many of them looked similar from the outside), bought groceries, went back to the condo, made dinner, then relaxed for the rest of the evening. It looked like we would be spending the next few days off-line.

Using my tablet in off-line mode in our sunroom overlooking the pool area

The next day, we decided to go back to the restaurant at the resort for an exorbitantly over-priced lunch, where we were told again that there was no Wi-Fi, and decided to go to plan b. We drove to the biggest town we could find, which was about 25 minutes away, walked around, again looking for Wi-Fi. None of the few cafes and restaurants that were even open had Wi-Fi.

Resorting to just trying to find an open hotspot, we kept searching. Finally! We found a signal that didn’t require a password. It just happened to be by a bench, so we sat down and downloaded maps of a national park where we could hike, some wineries, and of the area in general. We checked email and replied to the ones that we could.

After leaving this town, we decided it was so late in the afternoon pretty much all we had time to do was go to a winery. We went to MontGras, a “new winery, at only 22 years old,” in the words of our tasting guide. The grounds were lovely and it was a beautiful day out. From the comfort of a sitting area in the open-air patio, we had a tasting of 3 wines and appetizers to accompany the wines. First we had a Chardonnay from their Amaral line that was easily one of the best Chardonnays I’ve ever had and some cheese on a cracker with a touch of palm honey to begin. Next we had a Carmenere from their Intriga line that reminded me of Zinfandels (please don’t mistake me to mean White Zinfandels, which are nothing like red Zins) from California, paired with chorizo. Finally we had a Syrah from their Antu line paired with date and ham.

Our guide was very informative, gave us much history and information about the winery and different varieties of wines, and spoke perfect English. We bought a bottle of Carmenere using the 30% discount we were given for doing the tasting. Our tasting guide even gave us a bottle opener with the MontGras label on it for free when we mentioned we didn’t have a bottle opener in our condo where we were staying. We figured we’d take a chance coming back to the States and hoped it wouldn’t get confiscated (spoiler- it didn’t so we have a nice souvenir now!).

This was only the beginning of our week-long adventure in Las Cabras. The restaurant at our resort never did have Wi-Fi available while we were there. We learned there was a problem in the entire town with the internet that week. We only had Wi-Fi for about 30 minutes twice that week plus the roughly 10 minutes where we found the open spot, but each time we were relying on other people’s mobile phone hotspots. Twice at restaurants we were allowed to use data from the phones of extremely generous people working there when we inquired about Wi-Fi.

Other than going with almost no internet access for a week, we learned to be resilient in other ways during this week. In stores and restaurants no one spoke English so it was up to us to figure things out. How my husband figured out directions and how to get us to some of the places we went to is beyond me but I’m forever grateful. As a family we played card games and watched movies like “Madagascar” in Spanish. I’m sure given the choice any one of us would have gladly have chosen having internet access in our apartment, but I think not having it brought us a bit closer together. I know that week in Las Cabras is a week I will never forget.

Relaxing with mud masks

Just another beautiful sunset in Chile